Legalhttp://www.tuxmachines.org/taxonomy/term/106/all
enIntroducing Craig Topham, FSF copyright and licensing associatehttp://www.tuxmachines.org/node/128038
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<p class="dropcap-first">My name is Craig Topham, and I’m the latest to have the honor of being a copyright and licensing associate for the Free Software Foundation (FSF). I started work in November, and the delay in assembling my introductory blog post is a testament to how busy I have been. Although my post feels late, it gives me a chance to share my experience here at the FSF, along with sharing a little bit more about myself.</p>
<p>From 2005 to 2017, I worked as a PC/Network Technician for the City of Eugene, Oregon. The role had the inherent reward of allowing me to be a part of something much larger than myself. I was helping local government function. From the mayor and city council all the way to the summer staff that worked the front desk at the recreation department's swimming pools, I was one of many making it all work. It was even a part of my job to support some free software the city used! Sadly, a vast majority of the software that we used was proprietary, but despite the painful duty of supporting nonfree software, the overall experience felt pretty great. As I close that chapter of my life with all the wonderful memories and marks made, I am beset with a wild sense of relief. Like finding a rock in my shoe after twelve years, the alleviation is palatable: I never have to labor to master proprietary software again!</p>
<p>For unknown reasons (which I contemplate often), I did not learn about the free software movement until 2004, despite a lifetime of using computers. Like so many before me, my initial education on the movement came via Free Software, Free Society: Selected Essays of Richard M. Stallman. What so instantaneously drew me to free software was the simplicity of the four freedoms: run, edit, share, contribute. These freedoms, coupled with the ethical nature of the movement, made it a natural fit for me. It did not take me long to realize that this is what I needed to soothe my “How can I make the world a better place?” angst. Inevitably, I became an FSF associate member on October 28, 2007 because it was (and still is) the easiest way to help out. If you are reading this and you are not a member, I encourage you to change that and help make the world a better place.</p>
<p><a href="https://www.fsf.org/blogs/licensing/introducing-craig-topham-fsf-copyright-and-licensing-associate"><img src="/files/read-on-white.png" alt="Read more" title="Read the rest of this article" /></a></p>
http://www.tuxmachines.org/node/128038#commentsGNULegalWed, 11 Sep 2019 21:12:41 +0000Roy Schestowitz128038 at http://www.tuxmachines.orgAfter Red Hat, Homebrew removes MongoDB from core formulas due to its Server Side Public License adoptionhttp://www.tuxmachines.org/node/127903
<!--paging_filter--><p class="dropcap-first">In October, last year MongoDB announced that it’s switching to Server Side Public License (SSPL). Since then, Redhat dropped support for MongoDB in January from its Red Hat Enterprise Linux and Fedora. Now, Homebrew, a popular package manager for macOS has removed MongoDB from the Homebrew core formulas since MongoDB was migrated to a non open-source license.</p>
<p>[...]</p>
<p>In January this year, MongoDB received its first major blow when Red Hat dropped MongoDB over concerns related to its SSPL. Tom Callaway, the University outreach Team lead at Red Hat had said that SSPL is “intentionally crafted to be aggressively discriminatory towards a specific class of users. To consider the SSPL to be “Free” or “Open Source” causes that shadow to be cast across all other licenses in the FOSS ecosystem, even though none of them carry that risk.”</p>
<p>Subsequently, in February, Red Hat Satellite also decided to drop MongoDB and support PostgreSQL backend only. The Red Hat development team stated that PostgreSQL is a better solution in terms of the types of data and usage that Satellite requires.</p>
<p>In March, following all these changes, MongoDB withdrew the SSPL from the Open Source Initiative’s approval process. It was finally decided that SSPL will only require commercial users to open source their modified code, which means that any other user can still modify and use MongoDB code for free.</p>
<p><a href="https://hub.packtpub.com/after-red-hat-homebrew-removes-mongodb-from-core-formulas-due-to-its-server-side-public-license-adoption/"><img src="/files/read-on-white.png" alt="Read more" title="Read the rest of this article" /></a></p>
http://www.tuxmachines.org/node/127903#commentsOSSLegalMon, 09 Sep 2019 01:56:57 +0000Roy Schestowitz127903 at http://www.tuxmachines.orgOpen Source is more than licenseshttp://www.tuxmachines.org/node/127383
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<p class="dropcap-first">A few weeks ago I was honored to deliver the keynote of the Open Source Awards in Edinburgh. I decided to talk about a subject that I wanted to talk about for quite some time but never found the right opportunity for. There is no video recording of my talk but several people asked me for a summary. So I decided to use some spare time in a plane to summarize it in a blog post.</p>
<p>I started to use computers and write software in the early 80s when I was 10 years old. This was also the time when Richard Stallman wrote the 4 freedoms, started the GNU project, founded the FSF and created the GPL. His idea was that users and developers should be in control of the computer they own which requires Free Software. At the time the computing experience was only the personal computer in front of you and the hopefully Free and Open Source software running on it.</p>
<p>The equation was (Personal Hardware) + (Free Software) = (Digital Freedom)</p>
<p><a href="https://karlitschek.de/2019/08/open-source-if-more-than-licenses/"><img src="/files/read-on-white.png" alt="Read more" title="Read the rest of this article" /></a></p>
<p>Also: <a href="https://kushaldas.in/posts/how-to-crack-open-source.html" rel="nofollow">How to crack Open Source?</a></p>
http://www.tuxmachines.org/node/127383#commentsOSSLegalMon, 26 Aug 2019 13:10:01 +0000Rianne Schestowitz127383 at http://www.tuxmachines.orgA Cycle of Renewal, Broken: How Big Tech and Big Media Abuse Copyright Law to Slay Competitionhttp://www.tuxmachines.org/node/127137
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<p class="dropcap-first">
In 1950, a television salesman named Robert Tarlton put together a consortium of TV merchants in the town of Lansford, Pennsylvania to erect an antenna tall enough to pull down signals from Philadelphia, about 90 miles to the southeast. The antenna connected to a web of cables that the consortium strung up and down the streets of Lansford, bringing big-city TV to their customers — and making TV ownership for Lansfordites far more attractive. Though hobbyists had been jury-rigging their own "community antenna television" networks since 1948, no one had ever tried to go into business with such an operation. The first commercial cable TV company was born.</p>
<p>The rise of cable over the following years kicked off decades of political controversy over whether the cable operators should be allowed to stay in business, seeing as they were retransmitting broadcast signals without payment or permission and collecting money for the service. Broadcasters took a dim view of people using their signals without permission, which is a little rich, given that the broadcasting industry itself owed its existence to the ability to play sound recordings over the air without permission or payment.</p>
<p>The FCC brokered a series of compromises in the years that followed, coming up with complex rules governing which signals a cable operator could retransmit, which ones they must retransmit, and how much all this would cost. The end result was a second way to get TV, one that made peace with—and grew alongside—broadcasters, eventually coming to dominate how we get cable TV in our homes.</p>
<p>By 1976, cable and broadcasters joined forces to fight a new technology: home video recorders, starting with Sony's Betamax recorders. In the eyes of the cable operators, broadcasters, and movie studios, these were as illegitimate as the playing of records over the air had been, or as retransmitting those broadcasts over cable had been. Lawsuits over the VCR continued for the next eight years. In 1984, the Supreme Court finally weighed in, legalizing the VCR, and finding that new technologies were not illegal under copyright law if they were "capable of substantial noninfringing uses."</p>
<p><a href="https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2019/08/cycle-renewal-broken-how-big-tech-and-big-media-abuse-copyright-law-slay"><img src="/files/read-on-white.png" alt="Read more" title="Read the rest of this article" /></a></p>
http://www.tuxmachines.org/node/127137#commentsLegalMon, 19 Aug 2019 19:18:46 +0000Roy Schestowitz127137 at http://www.tuxmachines.orgREUSE makes copyright and licensing easier than ever http://www.tuxmachines.org/node/126716
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<p class="dropcap-first">
The licensing of a software project is critical information. Developers set the terms under which others can reuse their software, from individuals to giant corporations. Authors want to make sure that others adhere to their chosen licenses; potential re-users have to know the license of third-party software before publication; and companies have to ensure license compliance in their products that often build on top of existing projects. The REUSE project, led by the Free Software Foundation Europe (FSFE), helps all of these parties.</p>
<p>REUSE aims to have all copyright and licensing information stored as close to the source files as possible. This is achieved by directly adding this information to the file in a standardised and machine-readable form. If a file does not support that, a .license file or central DEP-5 configuration file can be used instead. This way, developers can be assured that re-users will not oversee copyright holders and their intended license.</p>
<p><a href="https://fsfe.org/news/2019/news-20190807-01.en.html"><img src="/files/read-on-white.png" alt="Read more" title="Read the rest of this article" /></a></p>
http://www.tuxmachines.org/node/126716#commentsLegalWed, 07 Aug 2019 19:12:29 +0000Rianne Schestowitz126716 at http://www.tuxmachines.orgOpen Invention Network, the Linux-based patent non-aggression community, exceeds 3,000 licenseeshttp://www.tuxmachines.org/node/125057
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<p class="dropcap-first">OIN's mission is to enable Linux, its related software, and its programmers to develop and monetize without being hogtied by patent fights. In Linux's early years, this was a constant threat. Now, thanks largely to the OIN's efforts to get everyone to agree on the basic open-source principle -- that's it's better and more profitable to share than to cling to proprietary property -- open-source software has taken off in the marketplace. </p>
<p>The OIN isn't the first to take this concept and apply it to the Unix/Linux operating system family. After Novell bought Unix from AT&amp;T, rather than keep fighting with Berkeley Software Design Inc. (BSDO) over possible Unix IP rights violations in BSD/OS, an early, commercial BSD Unix, Noorda famously declared that he'd rather compete in the marketplace than in court. This Unix case was settled in 1994.</p>
<p>That was a one off. The OIN, which has grown by 50% in the last two years, has turned patent non-aggression into policy for thousands of companies. By agreeing to the OIN license, members gain access to patented inventions worth hundreds of millions of dollars while promoting a favorable environment for Linux and related open source software.</p>
<p><a href="https://www.zdnet.com/article/open-invention-network-the-linux-based-patent-non-aggression-community-exceeds-3000-licensees/"><img src="/files/read-on-white.png" alt="Read more" title="Read the rest of this article" /></a></p>
http://www.tuxmachines.org/node/125057#commentsLinuxLegalWed, 19 Jun 2019 19:02:03 +0000Roy Schestowitz125057 at http://www.tuxmachines.orgMy personal journey from MIT to GPLhttp://www.tuxmachines.org/node/124911
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<p class="dropcap-first">As I got started writing open source software, I generally preferred the MIT license. I actually made fun of the “copyleft” GPL licenses, on the grounds that they are less free. I still hold this opinion today: the GPL license is less free than the MIT license - but today, I believe this in a good way. </p>
<p>[...]</p>
<p>I don’t plan on relicensing my historical projects, but my new projects have used the GPL family of licenses for a while now. I think you should seriously consider it as well.</p>
<p><a href="https://drewdevault.com/2019/06/13/My-journey-from-MIT-to-GPL.html"><img src="/files/read-on-white.png" alt="Read more" title="Read the rest of this article" /></a></p>
http://www.tuxmachines.org/node/124911#commentsGNULegalSat, 15 Jun 2019 16:07:44 +0000Roy Schestowitz124911 at http://www.tuxmachines.orgGPL Dodge and Compliancehttp://www.tuxmachines.org/node/124779
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<h5><a href="https://thenextweb.com/dd/2019/06/04/why-does-macos-catalina-use-zsh-instead-of-bash-licensing/" rel="nofollow">Why does macOS Catalina use Zsh instead of Bash? Licensing</a> [iophk: "s/patents/software patents/g; :("]</h5>
<blockquote><p>So, it’s no surprise that Apple’s moving its users away from Bash. I’m also not surprised to see Apple favor Zsh. For starters, it’s licensed under the MIT License, and therefore doesn’t contain the controversial language surrounding patents and Tivoization. </p>
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<h5><a href="https://www.notebookcheck.net/The-Redmi-S2-aka-Y2-gets-its-Android-Pie-update.423706.0.html" rel="nofollow">The Redmi S2, aka Y2, gets its Android Pie update</a></h5>
<blockquote><p>That may not be a huge deal to some users, however. Xiaomi is also obliged to release the S2/Y2's kernel sources in order to remain compliant with GNU's general public licence.</p></blockquote>
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http://www.tuxmachines.org/node/124779#commentsGNULegalTue, 11 Jun 2019 20:01:19 +0000Roy Schestowitz124779 at http://www.tuxmachines.orgEFF and Open Rights Group Defend the Right to Publish Open Source Software to the UK Governmenthttp://www.tuxmachines.org/node/124743
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<p class="dropcap-first">EFF and Open Rights Group today submitted formal comments to the British Treasury, urging restraint in applying anti-money-laundering regulations to the publication of open-source software.</p>
<p>The UK government sought public feedback on proposals to update its financial regulations pertaining to money laundering and terrorism in alignment with a larger European directive. The consultation asked for feedback on applying onerous customer due diligence regulations to the cryptocurrency space as well as what approach the government should take in addressing “privacy coins” like Zcash and Monero. Most worrisome, the government also asked “whether the publication of open-source software should be subject to [customer due diligence] requirements.”</p>
<p>We’ve seen these kind of attacks on the publication of open source software before, in fights dating back to the 90s, when the Clinton administration attempted to require that anyone merely publishing cryptography source code obtain a government-issued license as an arms dealer. Attempting to force today’s open-source software publishers to follow financial regulations designed to go after those engaged in money laundering is equally obtuse.</p>
<p><a href="https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2019/06/eff-and-open-rights-group-defend-right-publish-open-source-software-uk-government"><img src="/files/read-on-white.png" alt="Read more" title="Read the rest of this article" /></a></p>
http://www.tuxmachines.org/node/124743#commentsOSSSecurityLegalTue, 11 Jun 2019 10:04:07 +0000Roy Schestowitz124743 at http://www.tuxmachines.orgLicensing Changeshttp://www.tuxmachines.org/node/124693
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<h5><a href="https://sdtimes.com/os/cockroachdb-changes-its-open-source-licensing-model/" rel="nofollow">CockroachDB changes its open-source licensing model</a> [Ed: Waffling tom avoid saying it became proprietary]</h5>
<blockquote><p>Cockroach Labs has announced that it is switching CockroachDB away from the Apache License version 2 (APL).</p>
<p>According to Cockroach Labs, its business model has long relied on the assumption that “companies could build a business around a strong open source core product without a much larger technology platform company coming along and offering the same product as a service.” But this is no longer the case, the company explained.</p></blockquote>
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<h5><a href="https://www.geekwire.com/2019/another-open-source-database-company-will-tighten-licensing-strategy-wary-amazon-web-services/" rel="nofollow">Another open-source database company will tighten its licensing strategy, wary of Amazon Web Services</a> [Ed: Another reminder that all the cloudwashing by corporate media is an assault on FOSS because people are shamed into ceding control, giving all money and data to GAFAM]</h5>
<blockquote><p>Cockroach Labs, the New York-based database company behind the open-source CockroachDB database, will change the terms of the license agreement in the next version of the open-source project to prohibit cloud providers like Amazon Web Services from offering a commercial version of that project as a service.</p>
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<h5><a href="https://devclass.com/2019/06/05/cockroachdb-shelters-from-aws-extermination-under-business-software-license/" rel="nofollow">CockroachDB shelters from AWS extermination under Business Software License</a> [Ed: Amazon's assault on FOSS using the AWS/cloudwashing craze yields results; FOSS becoming proprietary software and GAFAM couldn't care less.]</h5>
<blockquote><p>Cockroach Labs has become the latest open source vendor to run for cover from AWS and other cloud vendors, by relicensing its CockroachDB under the Business Source License.</p>
<p>In a post explaining the move, the companies’ founders wrote “We’re witnessing the rise of highly-integrated providers take advantage of their unique position to offer “as-a-service” versions of OSS products, and offer a superior user experience as a consequence of their integrations.” They cited AWS’ forked version of ElasticSearch.</p>
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<h5><a href="https://www.i-programmer.info/news/136-open-source/12833-latest-fsf-updates-to-software-licenses.html" rel="nofollow">Latest FSF Updates To Software Licenses</a></h5>
<blockquote><p>If you've ever felt confused about open source licensing you are not alone. The good news is that the Free Software Foundation has a highly informative and well-maintained list of licenses, not only for software but also for documentation and for other works, drawing a distinction between free and non-free.</p>
<p>The fact that that the Personal Public Licence Version 3a and the Anti-996 Licence have both been added to the non-free list isn't really the important bit of this news item. It is that the existence of the Various Licences and Comments about Them that deserves being better known.</p></blockquote>
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http://www.tuxmachines.org/node/124693#commentsGNUOSSLegalSun, 09 Jun 2019 20:17:52 +0000Roy Schestowitz124693 at http://www.tuxmachines.orgLicensing: Companies That Close Down FOSS 'in the Cloud' and Latest GPL Compliance at OnePlushttp://www.tuxmachines.org/node/124058
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<h5><a href="https://siliconangle.com/2019/05/14/confluent-says-first-cloud-native-kafka-streaming-platform/" rel="nofollow">Confluent says it has the first cloud-native Kafka streaming platform</a></h5>
<blockquote><p>Open-source unicorn Confluent Inc. is ready to go head-to-head with cloud computing giants with the release of a cloud-native and fully managed service based upon the Apache Kafka streaming platform.</p>
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<h5><a href="https://www.javaworld.com/article/3394690/for-open-source-vs-proprietary-aws-might-have-it-both-ways.html" rel="nofollow">For open source vs. proprietary, AWS might have it both ways</a> [Ed: Mac Asay, Adobe, proponent of calling proprietary "open". IDG has just received money from Adobe (“BrandPost Sponsored by Adobe”) and Asay is now publishing articles owing to his employer paying the media. He’s is some kind of editor at InfoWorld (IDG). So the corporations basically buy ‘journalism’ (their staff as editors) at IDG.]</h5>
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<h5><a href="https://www.informationweek.com/why-open-source-should-remain-open/a/d-id/1334643" rel="nofollow">Why Open Source Should Remain Open</a></h5>
<blockquote><p>On one hand, the validation that comes along with major tech players offering open source fuels growth in the software. On the other, it also changes the platform from one that’s always been free and available to one that is only available with limitations and has red tape all around it. As some of these companies join in the open source community, they’re losing sight of the original goal and community. Instead, they are building artificial walls and shutting down many parts of what makes open source open. This isn’t a unique occurrence, it’s happening more and more frequently and is something that will completely rearrange the core of open source as we know it.</p>
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<h5><a href="https://piunikaweb.com/2019/05/18/breaking-oneplus-7-pro-root-achieved-on-global-and-indian-variants-kernel-source-codes-released/" rel="nofollow">BREAKING: OnePlus 7 Pro root achieved on global and Indian variants, kernel source codes released</a></h5>
<blockquote><p>OnePlus phones are known for their developer friendliness as well as strong aftermarket development community. The Chinese OEM prefers to mandate GPL and push kernel source codes in a timely manner, which is a godsend compared to most of their competitors.</p>
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<h5><a href="https://www.goandroid.co.in/oneplus-7-pro-kernel-source-code-is-now-out-expect-custom-roms-soon/100919/" rel="nofollow">OnePlus 7 / 7 Pro kernel source code is now out, expect custom ROMs soon</a></h5>
<blockquote><p>OnePlus announced the most-awaited OnePlus 7 and OnePlus 7 Pro last week. Both the smartphones are already on sale and can be bought in all the countries they are available. Even the OnePlus 7 Pro received its maiden update which brings April security patch and more. As usual, the kernel source for the OnePlus 7 series is now out too in a timely manner. Thus, users can expect custom ROMS sooner than later.</p>
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http://www.tuxmachines.org/node/124058#commentsOSSLegalMon, 20 May 2019 10:50:25 +0000Roy Schestowitz124058 at http://www.tuxmachines.orgGoogle GPL Compliance and Free Software Legal and Licensing Workshop 2019 http://www.tuxmachines.org/node/123724
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<h5><a href="https://www.xda-developers.com/google-pixel-3a-xl-forums-kernel-source-code/" rel="nofollow">Google Pixel 3a and Pixel 3a XL forums and kernel source code are up</a></h5>
<blockquote><p>Google’s newly launched Pixel 3a series matches up to the photography skills of the flagship Pixel 3 series, even while being priced at only half. But besides bringing the characteristic photography acumen of a Google Pixel, the Pixel 3a devices also share some part of their DNA with the erstwhile Google Nexus lineup. This is because they’re easy on the pocket (at least in the Western markets) and should, thus, be preferred by developers as devices meant to test the latest features in Android.</p>
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<h5><a href="https://www.carmenbianca.eu/en/post/2019-04-13-renewed-focus-on-reuse/" rel="nofollow">Renewed focus on REUSE</a></h5>
<blockquote><p>Following the Free Software Legal and Licensing Workshop 2019 in Barcelona, I managed to get in touch with some people to put a renewed focus on the REUSE initiative by the FSFE. </p></blockquote>
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<h5><a href="https://lwn.net/Articles/786993/" rel="nofollow">ClearlyDefined: Putting license information in one place</a> [Ed: Why is an FSFE workshop led by a Microsoft employee? Explains some things I've seen about FSFE lately (not good things). Be careful of ClearlyDefined because mostly Microsoft people promote it (everywhere they can). So you know it's Microsoft-leaning an effort and Microsoft is a serial GPL violator that got caught many times.]</h5>
<blockquote><p>As the stats page shows, there are nearly five million definitions currently in the database (as of this writing, anyway). Multiple repositories are being harvested, including npm for Node.js, PyPI for Python, Maven for Java, Crate for Rust, GitHub, and others. ClearlyDefined was the subject of a lively workshop at the recent FSFE Legal and Licensing Workshop (LLW), led by project lead Jeff McAffer of GitHub. The project has lots of partners, such as Google, Microsoft, Amazon Web Services, Qualcomm, Software Heritage, and Codescoop.</p></blockquote>
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http://www.tuxmachines.org/node/123724#commentsOSSLegalThu, 09 May 2019 22:35:47 +0000Roy Schestowitz123724 at http://www.tuxmachines.orgFOSS Licensing Debates at OSI and New Open Data From Recursionhttp://www.tuxmachines.org/node/123609
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<h5><a href="https://opensource.org/LicenseDiscuss042019" rel="nofollow">April 2019 License-Discuss Summary</a></h5>
<blockquote><p>Antoine Thomas asks whether a contributor would be able to revoke/remove their contributions from a project, and how this would affect old versions of a project.</p>
<p>Kevin Fleming responds that legitimately provided open source licenses are not revocable, but that a project might honor a request out of courtesy.</p>
<p>Brendan Hickey points out that copyright law may provide special revocation rights, e.g. 17 USC §203. And even without revocation, a contributor could make life difficult for users.</p></blockquote>
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<h5><a href="https://opensource.org/LicenseReview042019" rel="nofollow">April 2019 License-Review Summary</a></h5>
<blockquote><p>Van Lindberg submits his Cryptographic Autonomy License (CAL) to the review process. This is a network copyleft license, but with a broader scope than the AGPL. The CAL is motivated by ensuring user autonomy in blockchain-based applications. Lindberg has also written an in-depth blog post that serves as a rationale document. Last month, there had already been preliminary discussion about the license on the license-discuss list (see the summary).</p>
<p>[...]</p>
<p>Pamela Chestek provides a careful analysis of unclear language in the license.</p>
<p>Henrik Ingo is concerned that the anti-DRM provision might not be effective, which leads to some comparisons with the GPLv3 [1,2,3,4].
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<h5><a href="https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20190506005047/en/Recursion-Releases-Open-Source-Data-Largest-Dataset-Biological" rel="nofollow">Recursion Releases Open-Source Data from Largest Ever Dataset of Biological Images, Inviting Data Science Community to Develop New and Improved Machine Learning Algorithms for the Life Sciences Industry</a></h5>
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http://www.tuxmachines.org/node/123609#commentsOSSLegalTue, 07 May 2019 05:12:19 +0000Roy Schestowitz123609 at http://www.tuxmachines.orgLicensing/Legal Facets of FOSShttp://www.tuxmachines.org/node/123453
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<h5><a href="https://www.promotionworld.com/articles/web-design/190502-5-best-drag-drop-builders-wordpress-2019" rel="nofollow">5 Best Drag and Drop Builders For WordPress of 2019</a> [Ed: And proprietary software with "free bait".]</h5>
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Depends on your requirements, really. One thing that you need to keep in mind is that the prices are different for different packages, so money is a factor you need to consider before making the decision. For example, Elementor could as well have been the best for beginners had their license not been so restrictive. Also, their Pro version is not GPL.</p>
<p>Other such drawbacks for other builders make Beaver Builder and Divi clearly the most preferred WordPress page builders. Visual Composer comes very close to these two. So, while there may be a bit of a pocket pinch, you can go for any of these if you want to be on safe hands. Also, while the recent Gutenberg editor holds a lot of promise, it is still going to be a while before it comes anywhere close to any of these powerful builders.</p></blockquote>
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<h5><a href="https://blog.ffwll.ch/2019/05/upstream-first.html" rel="nofollow">Upstream First</a></h5>
<blockquote><p>This talk was mostly aimed at managers of engineering teams and projects with fairly little experience in shipping open source, and much less experience in shipping open source through upstream cross vendor projects like the kernel. It goes through all the usual failings and missteps and explains why an upstream first strategy is the right one, but with a twist: Instead of technical reasons, it’s all based on economical considerations of why open source is succeeding. Fundamentally it’s not about the better software, or the cheaper prize, or that the software freedoms are a good thing worth supporting.</p>
<p>Instead open source is eating the world because it enables a much more competitive software market. And all the best practices around open development are just to enable that highly competitive market. Instead of arguing that open source has open development and strongly favours public discussions because that results in better collaboration and better software we put on the economic lens, and private discussions become insider trading and collusions. And that’s just not considered cool in a competitive market. Similar arguments can be made with everything else going on in open source projects.</p></blockquote>
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<h5><a href="https://lwn.net/Articles/786304/" rel="nofollow">The sustainability of open source for the long term</a></h5>
<blockquote><p>The problem of "sustainability" for open-source software is a common topic of conversation in our community these days. We covered a talk by Bradley Kuhn on sustainability a month ago. Another longtime community member, Luis Villa, gave his take on the problem of making open-source projects sustainable at the 2019 Legal and Licensing Workshop (LLW) in Barcelona. Villa is one of the co-founders of Tidelift, which is a company dedicated to helping close the gap so that the maintainers of open-source projects get paid in order to continue their work.</p></blockquote>
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<h5><a href="https://lwn.net/Articles/786305/" rel="nofollow">On technological liberty</a></h5>
<blockquote><p>In his keynote at the 2019 Legal and Licensing Workshop (LLW), longtime workshop participant Andrew Wilson looked at the past, but he went much further back than, say, the history of free software—or even computers. His talk looked at technological liberty in the context of classical liberal philosophic thinking. He mapped some of that thinking to the world of free and open-source software (FOSS) and to some other areas where our liberties are under attack.</p>
<p>He began by showing a video of the band "Tears for Fears" playing their 1985 hit song "Everybody wants to rule the world", though audio problems made it impossible to actually hear the song; calls for Wilson to sing it himself were shot down, perhaps sadly, though he and the audience did give the chorus a whirl. In 1985, the band members were young and so was open source, he said. But there were new digital synthesizers available, with an open standard (MIDI) that allowed these instruments to talk to one another. It freed musicians from the need for expensive studio time, since they could write and polish their music anywhere: a great example of technological freedom.</p></blockquote>
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http://www.tuxmachines.org/node/123453#commentsOSSLegalThu, 02 May 2019 15:29:43 +0000Roy Schestowitz123453 at http://www.tuxmachines.orgCrowdsourcing license compliance with ClearlyDefinedhttp://www.tuxmachines.org/node/123443
<!--paging_filter--><p><img src="https://opensource.com/sites/default/files/styles/image-full-size/public/lead-images/OSDC_Crowdfunding_520x292_9597717_0612CM.png?itok=lxSKyFXU" border="0" align="left" width="160" hspace="20" vspace="20" style="padding: 17px 17px 17px 17px; box-shadow: 5px 5px 5px #222;" /></p>
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Open source use continues to skyrocket, not just in use cases and scenarios but also in volume. It is trivial for a developer to depend on a 1,000 JavaScript packages from a single run of npm install or have thousands of packages in a Docker image. At the same time, there is increased interest in ensuring license compliance. </p>
<p>Without the right license you may not be able to legally use a software component in the way you intend or may have obligations that run counter to your business model. For instance, a JavaScript package could be marked as MIT license, which allows commercial reuse, while one of its dependencies is licensed has a copyleft license that requires you give your software away under the same license. Complying means finding the applicable license(s), and assessing and adhering to the terms, which is not too bad for individual components adn can be daunting for large initiatives.</p>
<p><a href="https://opensource.com/article/19/5/license-compliance-clearlydefined"><img src="/files/read-on-white.png" alt="Read more" title="Read the rest of this article" /></a></p>
http://www.tuxmachines.org/node/123443#commentsOSSLegalThu, 02 May 2019 08:41:42 +0000Rianne Schestowitz123443 at http://www.tuxmachines.org